"When you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely, in your thoughts, advanced to the stage of science, whatever the matter may be."
Lord Kelvin

Publications

ANTICORRP Conference on public procurement and corruption risks

Presentations, Publications

The Corvinus University of Budapest (CUB) organized a conference about the ANTICORRP research program, the Hungarian government’s anti-corruption policy and the new public procurement law on 12th May 2015. After István János Tóth’s (CRCB) opening and presentation about the ANTICORRP program’s objectives and results, dr. László Kovács (Prime Minister’s Office) presented the most important changes in the new Hungarian public procurement law. Mihály Fazekas (CUB, CRCB) highlighted some recent results of measuring corruption risks of public procurement in the read more

EU funds and corruption risks in Hungary

Presentations, Publications

In the past few weeks, the European Commission found serious problems in the allocation of EU funded public procurement contracts in Hungary and the suspicion of cartel was also raised. According to the researches of CRCB, the corruption risks for EU funded contracts are slightly higher than national ones on the European level, but in Hungary the risks are significantly higher. These additional corruption risks are in connection with the low quality of the institutional environment in the country. read more

Mapping high-level corruption risks in Spanish public procurement

Publications, Reports

Alejandro Ferrando Gamir

Abstract

High-level corruption and fraud has had an increased impact on the social and political debate in Spain, especially since the beginning of the financial crisis when several cuts in social spending were made. Greater attention is being paid to where and how the government spends its public resources. This paper explores the extent and forms of political corruption in Spanish public procurement. Its main contribution is the rich analytical discussion of read more

CRCB-WP/2014:02

Publications, Working Papers

Czibik, Á – Fazekas, M – Tóth, B – Tóth I J: Toolkit for detecting collusive bidding in public procurement. With examples from Hungary. Working Paper Series: CRCB-WP/2014:02.

Across the globe, the exposure of collusive behaviour of companies in procurement markets is predominantly based on qualitative information from firms or individuals involved in collusion. This makes detection rare and titled towards disintegrating bidding rings. Economic analysis, modelling and forecasting have a limited role in this field. However, the increasing availability of large read more

Corruption risks of the nuclear power plant investments: What can we expect in the case of Paks II?

Presentations, Publications, Reports

In January 2014 the Hungarian Government announced that it reached an agreement with the government of Russia concerning the construction of two new reactors to replace current capacity at the Paks nuclear power plant. Paks I. is a Soviet-built plant operational since 1983-1987. It is the only nuclear power plant in the country and provides about 40% of Hungarian electricity consumption. With an estimated budget of 3-4 trillion Hungarian forint (9-13 billion euros), the project will be the single largest investment in read more

Finding the hay stack and the needle. Using Big Data to evaluate public procurement performance

Presentations, Publications

Mihály Fazekas presented at the International Corruption Hunters Alliance meeting organised by the World Bank in Washington DC. This conference brought together heads and senior officials of corruption investigating bodies and prosecuting authorities, anti-corruption experts, academics, and representatives of international organizations from over 130 countries. His presentation was part of the panel on how to use data mining and ‘Big Data’ to better detect, investigate, and prevent corruption in financial flows, development aid, and government contracts. read more

CRCB-WP/2014:01

Publications, Working Papers

Fazekas, M – Tóth, I J: From corruption to state capture:  A new analytical framework with empirical applications from Hungary. Working Paper Series: CRCB-WP/2014:01.
State capture and corruption are widespread phenomena across the globe, but their empirical study is still highly challenging. This paper develops a new conceptual and analytical framework for gauging state capture based on micro-level contractual networks in public procurement. To this end, it first establishes a robust measure of corruption risks in public procurement transactions focusing on relationships between pairs of issuers and suppliers. Second, it searches for read more

Analytical framework to capture corruption and collusion risks in public procurement

Presentations, Publications

Mihály Fazekas briefed European Commission and Member State public procurement officials about the CRCB risk assessment methodology and future perspectives for collaboration within CRCB’s new large-scale research program, called DIGIWHIST. His presentation was part of the meeting of the Economic and Statistical Working Group (Advisory Committee on Public Procurement) 12th of November 2014, read more

New ways to measure institutionalised grand corruption in public procurement

Publications, Reports

Fazekas M. – Tóth I. J.. (2014), New ways to measure institutionalised grand corruption in public procurement. U4 Policy Brief, October 2014 No 9, CMI-U4.

Public procurement, one of the largest areas of public spending worldwide, gives public officials wide discretion. It is therefore unsurprising that it is also one of the government functions most often vulnerable to corruption. While there have been many qualitative accounts of high-level corruption in public contracting, it is only recently that read more

EU Funds’ curse? The impact of EU Funds on institutionalised grand corruption in CEE

Presentations, Publications

Mihály Fazekas presented CRCB’s research at the launch event of the second ANTICORRP volume: The Anticorruption Frontline at the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin.

The presentation focused on the main findings of the chapter co-authored by CRCB researchers István Jánost Tóth and Mihály Fazekas. In addition, it also presented new research perspectives including the authors work using EU-wide public procurement data as well as the exciting new research grant they recently won, called DIGIWHIST: “The Digital Whistleblower. Fiscal read more